Videology and Utopia

NOTES

INTRODUCTION

1 The term ‘virtuality’, though not commonly used in English, has been retained to translate virtualité, in the third sense given by the ‘Oxford English Dictionary’: ‘A virtual (as opposed to an actual) thing, capacity, etc.: a potentiality. “A Virtuality perfected into an Actuality”. Thomas Carlyle, ‘Past and Present’, iv, i (1843).’ The adjective ‘virtual’ has largely been avoided, since its normal acceptation: ‘that is so in essence or effect, although not formally or actually’ is misleading in the present context, although its special use in optics is suggestive. (Ed.)

2 He cited, among others, the following application of this idea: when confidence falls on Wall Street, share prices fall, and if share prices fall, confidence ...